Intelligent electric stove

ABSTRACT

An intelligent electric stove has: a controller including a hardware interface for communication with hardware, wherein the controller has a memory to store therein a pre-set cooking solution as an application program; a user interface coupled to the controller and configured to allow a user to control an operation of the stove; a timer coupled to the controller and configured to set operation timing of the stove; a display unit coupled to the controller and configured to output operation states of the stove; a sensing unit coupled to the controller and configured to detect operation state; and a wireless communication unit coupled to the controller and configured to allow the stove to communicate wirelessly with external devices.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application claims the benefit of Korean patent application No.10-2014-0095148 filed on Jul. 26, 2014, the entire content of which isincorporated herein by reference for all purposes as if fully set forthherein.

BACKGROUND

Field of the Present Disclosure

The present disclosure relates to an electric stove, and, moreparticularly, to an intelligent electric stove wherein a cooking utensiland the electric stove communicate with each other via amachine-to-machine communication or the person and the electric stovecommunicate with each other via a person-to-machine communication.

Discussion of Related Art

Electric stove is excellent in terms of control of output and safety incomparison with gas stove.

Further, since it does not burn gas to generate a heat source, it isattracting attention as a clean kitchen appliance which does notgenerate carbon dioxide and harmful gas during cooking and does notpollute indoor air.

Such an electric stove is divided into a halogen lamp type, a heatingcoil type and an induction type depending on a method of generating aheat source. The halogen and heating coil types are used in combinationto complement each other's disadvantages.

FIG. 1 shows a configuration of a function control unit or userinterface generally used in the conventional electric stove describedabove. The function control unit or user interface includes a powerbutton 10, a thermal power control button 20, and a reserved timesetting button (timer) 30 having a time switch function. The buttons maybe displayed using LEDs.

These control buttons are arranged variously depending on the stovedesigner. They focus on the functional arrangement rather than user'sconvenience. Thus, position variations of the control interfaces may notfeasible or additional functions may not be added.

The conventional electric stoves may not provide a functional merit oruser convenience other than the safety, the firepower output control ina step by step manner, and the timer function.

SUMMARY

In order to solve the problems, the present disclosure is intended toimprove the user's convenience by configuring the electric stove suchthat a cooking utensil and the electric stove communicate with eachother via a machine-to-machine communication or the person and theelectric stove communicate with each other via a person-to-machinecommunication.

Another object of the present disclosure is to enable an audio inputfunction, a remote control function, and an output function of anoperation state of the stove or a cooking utensil placed on the stove.

In one aspect, there is provided an intelligent electric stovecomprising: a controller including a hardware interface forcommunication with hardware, wherein the controller has a memory tostore therein a pre-set cooking solution as an application program; auser interface coupled to the controller and configured to allow a userto control an operation of the stove; a timer coupled to the controllerand configured to set operation timing of the stove; a display unitcoupled to the controller and configured to output operation states ofthe stove; a sensing unit coupled to the controller and configured todetect operation state; and a wireless communication unit coupled to thecontroller and configured to allow the stove to communicate wirelesslywith external devices.

In one implementation, the memory stores therein an operating system,and application programs operatively associated with the operationsystem, wherein the application programs includes the cooking solution.

In one implementation, the user interface includes a heating regionselection menu, a heating power adjustment menu, and/or a timing menu.

In one implementation, the display unit is operatively associated withthe user interface.

In one implementation, the communication unit communicates with acooking utensil and/or mobile device using at least one of RFID, NFC,Bluetooth, Zigbee, and WiFi protocols.

In one implementation, the communication unit communicates with a stovehood using at least one of RFID, NFC, Bluetooth, Zigbee, and WiFiprotocols.

In one implementation, the controller is configured to download and/orupdate the cooking solution from a web server or a mobile device usingthe communication unit.

In one implementation, the intelligent electric stove further includesan audio interface configured to output operation states of the electricstove to the user using a voice and/or to input a user voice input tothe controller.

In one implementation, the audio interface includes a sound output unit,a sound input unit and a voice recognition engine.

In one implementation, the intelligent electric stove further includes aweight sensor configured to detect a weight of a cooking utensil placedon a heating region, wherein the weight sensor is positioned nearby orin the heating region.

In one implementation, the intelligent electric stove further includes aDC (direct current) wireless power transmitter configured to wirelesslysupply a power to a cooking utensil placed on the stove, wherein thecooking utensil has a communication unit or sensor unit.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 shows a view of control buttons for a conventional electricstove.

FIG. 2 show a view of a system in which a smart electric stove inaccordance with the present disclosure is implemented.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a first embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a second embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a third embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a fourth embodiment of the present disclosure.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart for illustrating a first example of an operationof the intelligent electric stove in accordance with the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 8 is a flow chart for illustrating a second example of an operationof the intelligent electric stove in accordance with the presentdisclosure.

FIG. 9 is a flow chart for illustrating a third example of an operationof the intelligent electric stove in accordance with the presentdisclosure.

DETAILED DESCRIPTIONS

Examples of various embodiments are illustrated and described furtherbelow. It will be understood that the description herein is not intendedto limit the claims to the specific embodiments described. On thecontrary, it is intended to cover alternatives, modifications, andequivalents as may be included within the spirit and scope of thepresent disclosure as defined by the appended claims.

It will be understood that when an element or layer is referred to asbeing “connected to”, or “coupled to” another element or layer, it canbe directly on, connected to, or coupled to the other element or layer,or one or more intervening elements or layers may be present. Inaddition, it will also be understood that when an element or layer isreferred to as being “between” two elements or layers, it can be theonly element or layer between the two elements or layers, or one or moreintervening elements or layers may also be present.

The terminology used herein is for the purpose of describing particularembodiments only and is not intended to be limiting of the presentdisclosure. As used herein, the singular forms “a” and “an” are intendedto include the plural forms as well, unless the context clearlyindicates otherwise. It will be further understood that the terms“comprises”, “comprising”, “includes”, and “including” when used in thisspecification, specify the presence of the stated features, integers,operations, elements, and/or components, but do not preclude thepresence or addition of one or more other features, integers,operations, elements, components, and/or portions thereof. As usedherein, the term “and/or” includes any and all combinations of one ormore of the associated listed items. Expression such as “at least oneof” when preceding a list of elements may modify the entire list ofelements and may not modify the individual elements of the list.

FIG. 2 show a view of a system in which a smart electric stove inaccordance with the present disclosure is implemented. In the system,the electric stove 100 may be communicatively connected to a cookingutensil 200, a stove hood 300, and a mobile device 400 in a M2M (Machineto Machine) manner and may be communicatively connected to a person in aM2P (Machine to People) manner. This may be achieved using IoT (Internetof Things).

Further, to act as a communication hub between devices, the intelligentelectric stove 100 collects and stores operation data in the stove, andfinally transmits the data to the cloud server so that the data isintegrated and managed.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a first embodiment of the present disclosure. The intelligentelectric stove may include a main control unit 110, a display unit 140,a communication unit 170, and a heating unit 120.

The main control unit 110 has a configuration in which a hardware (H/W)having an interface for connecting various devices and software (S/W)installed for the operations of the hardware are integrated. Further,the software includes an operating platform OS and a service orapplication platform.

The operating platform uses an open source OS such as Linux and Android,and may be used with an application Tizen in the future. The serviceplatform creates a cooking solution that allows all functions of thestove to be controlled.

The operation and function selection of a function controller 131 and atimer 132 used for controlling the thermal power, and selecting aheating region, etc. are integrated into a touch screen 140. Thefunction controller 131 may include the user interface to allow the userto select operation of the stove.

The display unit 140 displays an operation state of the electric stoveor an array of menus that are supported by the cooking solution and mayinclude a liquid crystal panel. The display unit 140 may be designed torealize User Interface (UI) and User Experience (UX). Further, thedesigned menus and buttons may be associated with the touch screen 130attached to the liquid crystal panel.

The communication unit 170 supports NFC, RFID, ZigBee, Bluetooth andWiFi for wireless communication with external devices such as thecooking utensil 200, stove hood 300 and mobile device 400. Via thecommunication unit 170, firmware or service platform or a software canbe added to the main control unit 110 or may be updated. The firmware orservice platform or a software may be downloaded via Internet directlyor via a mobile device through the communication unit 170.

Reference numeral 120 denotes a heating unit which is a heat sourceconnected to a power source through a power control unit. Referencenumeral 130 denotes a power button. Reference numeral 160 denotes asensor unit for sensing operational conditions and installed inside theelectric stove for safety.

FIG. 4 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a second embodiment of the present disclosure, wherein an audiointerface 180 is added to the configuration of the first embodiment ofthe intelligent electric stove.

The audio interface 180 is used to inform the status of the electricstove using a voice form and/or to control the function of the stovedirectly by voice when the user can not directly touch the functionbutton during cooking.

To this end, the audio interface 180 includes a microphone 181 connectedto the main control unit 110 for input/output, a loudspeaker 182, and avoice recognition engine 183 installed as a middleware of the mainplatform.

In one example, when the user voices words “turn off”, “heat up”, “heatdown”, “turn on a hood”, or “turn off a hood”, the audio interface 180senses and recognize the words to form signals and send the signals tothe main control unit 110 to control the operations of the stovecorrespondingly.

FIG. 5 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a third embodiment of the present disclosure. In this embodiment,the configuration of the second embodiment further includes a weightsensor 161 as a sensing unit 160. The weight sensor 161 is locatedadjacent to a heating region of the electric stove so as to protrudefrom a surface of the heating region. The weight sensor 161 is used tomeasure the weight of the contents in the container when the cookingutensil is put on the heating region to load on the weight sensor 161.

This may be used to predict the cooking time of the food contained inthe cooking utensil, or to prevent the cooking utensil from being heatedwithout food being filled.

FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an intelligent electric stove in accordancewith a fourth embodiment of the present disclosure. In this embodiment,the configuration of the third embodiment further includes a wirelesspower supply unit 190. The wireless power supply unit or transmitterunit 190 may be configured to supply wireless DC power to the cookingutensil in order that the status of the cooking utensil 200 may be sentto the electric stove wirelessly. In this connection, the cookingutensil 200 has a sensing unit to sense the state thereof. For example,the cooking utensil 200 has a temperature sensor.

Hereinafter, various examples of operations of the intelligent electricstove in accordance with the above embodiments will be described.

First Example (Automatic Control Function for Pot)

First, the example may begin by registering dedicated cooking utensilsthe user wants to use on the electric stove. Registration method is asfollow: when the dedicated cooking utensil is placed on the stove, thestove is synchronized with the cooking utensil, such that informationsuch as model name, container floor area, capacity and weight of thecooking utensil is registered into the cooking solution via RFID, NFC,Zigbee and Bluetooth. In this connection, the cooking utensil may have atransmitter or RFID transmitter to transmit the information thereof tothe stove.

FIG. 7 is a flow chart for illustrating a first example of an operationof the intelligent electric stove in accordance with the presentdisclosure. Referring to FIG. 7, when the water filled pot is placed onone heating region of the electric stove 100, the electric stove issynchronized with the pot to prepare for the operation. When the startbutton is pressed, the firepower will start heating and adjust the levelof the heating power based on the sensed floor area of the pot and thesensed amount of water (S1, S2).

At this time, the stove estimates the cooking time by measuring theamount of water contained in the pot through the weight sensor 161.

When the internal temperature of the pot reaches 100° C., the sensor inthe pot may detects this and sends it to the electric stove (S3).

When the electric stove receives the detection, the electric stoveadjusts the level of the fire power to zero and notifies the completionof the cooking process through a beep or a mobile device application andfinishes the cooking process (S4, S5, S6)

When the cooking time that is expected in this process exceeds apredetermined time, the stove adjusts the firepower to 0 level and sendswarning alarm.

The above example can be applied to any cooking utensil that is used toboil water in the registered cooking utensil rather than limited to thepot. The above operation of the first example may be programmed in thecooking solution stored in the memory in the main control unit 110.

Second Example (Control Function Based on Recipe)

FIG. 8 is a flow chart for illustrating a second example of an operationof the intelligent electric stove in accordance with the presentdisclosure. FIG. 8 shows an example of registering and executing arecipe such as ramen cooking in a cooking solution.

Referring to FIG. 8, when the water filled pot is placed on one heatingregion of the electric stove 100, the electric stove is synchronizedwith the pot to prepare for the operation. When the start button ispressed, the firepower will start heating and adjust the level of theheating power based on the sensed floor area of the pot and the sensedamount of water (S1, S2).

At this time, the stove estimates the cooking time by measuring theamount of water contained in the pot through the weight sensor 161.

When the water starts to boil, the sensed information in the vessel issent to the electric stove and informs the user that the water hasboiled and noodle and seasoning agents should be put in (S3, S4). Atthis time, sound can be informed directly. Alternatively, the display ofthe electric stove may display the image of the food to be injected intothe pot. Alternatively, the mobile device can may display the image ofthe food to be injected into the pot. This procedure may be set into thecooking solution.

Thereafter, in operation S6, it is recognized by the timer whether theindicated proper cooking time on the ramen package, for example, 4minutes and 30 seconds has lapsed. If so, the electric stove adjusts theheating power level to 0 level (S7). Then, the stove informs the user ofthe cooking completion of the ramen (S8). In this way, the cookingprocess may end (S9).

In this example, the recipe of simple ramen cooking is given as anexample. However, in the case of complicated cooking process, time forfood injection into the pot and/or the thermal power control may bepre-set in the cooking solution.

Third Example (Programmed Control for Pressurized Cooking Container)

FIG. 9 is a flow chart for illustrating a third example of an operationof the intelligent electric stove in accordance with the presentdisclosure. FIG. 9 describes the process of cooking rice usingpressurized cooking container merely by selecting the menu preprogrammedin the cooking solution until the completion of rice cooking.

A dedicated pressurized cooking container used here has a solenoid valvewhich is operated by an electrical signal in addition to the temperaturesensor.

First, when the water and raw rice is injected into the pressurizedcooking container registered onto the present electric stove and isplaced on the heating region of the stove, the user may press the ricecooking button in the user interface corresponding to the menu of thecooking solution. In this embodiment, the heating power level may beadjusted automatically according to the timing schedule preset into thecooking solution.

The operation A in the figure is to maintain the proper cookingcondition of 1.2 atmospheric pressure and 122° C. in the cooking processusing the pressurized cooking container. The operation A may beincorporated at least one time during the entire cooking process.

In operation (S7), the firepower level of the stove is adjusted to 0 andthe zero level lasts for a predetermined time while the cookingcompletion is not notified to the user. This is for complete softeningof the raw rice by uniform transfer of the heat to the inner portion ofthe rice. Thereafter, in order to open the lid of the container safelyafter the lapse of the cooking time, the user may remove the operatingpressure on the solenoid valve to relieve pressure.

The heating powers and cooking times presented here are for explanationpurposes only. Thus, the present disclosure is not limited thereto.

Combining these series of cooking factors, various kinds of foods forexample, rice, potato, beef, chicken, etc. can be cooked using thecombination of the present stove and the pressurized cooking utensil.

Further, regarding the operation of the stove hood 300, which is missingfrom the examples, when the cooking temperature of the cooking utensil200 during cooking by electric stove 200 react a predeterminedtemperature, the electric stove confirms the operation status of thestove hood by inter-communication between the hood and the stove. Whenthe hood is not in operation, the stove sends an operation signal sothat the stove hood 300 operates.

At a predetermined time after the cooking process of the electric stoveis completed, the operation of the stove hood 300 is checked again. Whenthe stove hood 300 is still operating, the stop signal is transmitted tostop the operation.

Further, when the stove hood is continuously operated for a certainperiod of time when the electric stove is not in operation, the user isnotified of the stove hood abnormality to the user.

INDUSTRIAL APPLICATION

In addition, although the above-described examples only describe generalcontainers such as pots, general cooking utensils and pressurizedcooking containers, the present disclosure is not limited thereto. Forexample, the present stove may be combined with the steamer container orboiler container, etc.

What is claimed is:
 1. An intelligent electric stove comprising: acontroller including a hardware interface for communication withhardware, wherein the controller has a memory to store therein a pre-setcooking solution as an application program; a user interface coupled tothe controller and configured to allow a user to control an operation ofthe stove; a timer coupled to the controller and configured to setoperation timing of the stove; a display unit coupled to the controllerand configured to output operation states of the stove; a sensing unitcoupled to the controller and configured to detect operation state; anda wireless communication unit coupled to the controller and configuredto allow the stove to communicate wirelessly with external devices. 2.The intelligent electric stove of claim 1, wherein the memory storestherein an operating system, and application programs operativelyassociated with the operation system, wherein the application programsincludes the cooking solution.
 3. The intelligent electric stove ofclaim 1, wherein the user interface includes a heating region selectionmenu, a heating power adjustment menu, and/or a timing menu.
 4. Theintelligent electric stove of claim 1, wherein the display unit isoperatively associated with the user interface.
 5. The intelligentelectric stove of claim 1, wherein the communication unit communicateswith a cooking utensil and/or mobile device using at least one of RFID,NFC, Bluetooth, Zigbee, and WiFi protocols.
 6. The intelligent electricstove of claim 1, wherein the communication unit communicates with astove hood using at least one of RFID, NFC, Bluetooth, Zigbee, and WiFiprotocols.
 7. The intelligent electric stove of claim 1, wherein thecontroller is configured to download and/or update the cooking solutionfrom a web server or a mobile device using the communication unit. 8.The intelligent electric stove of claim 1, further including an audiointerface configured to output operation states of the electric stove tothe user using a voice and/or to input a user voice input to thecontroller.
 9. The intelligent electric stove of claim 8, wherein theaudio interface includes a sound output unit, a sound input unit and avoice recognition engine.
 10. The intelligent electric stove of claim 1,further including a weight sensor configured to detect a weight of acooking utensil placed on a heating region, wherein the weight sensor ispositioned nearby or in the heating region.
 11. The intelligent electricstove of claim 1, further including a DC (direct current) wireless powertransmitter configured to wirelessly supply a power to a cooking utensilplaced on the stove, wherein the cooking utensil has a communicationunit or sensor unit.